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PHILADELPHIA! 

J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY. 

1891. 



PHILADELPHIA. 



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Copyright, 1891, by J. B. Lippincott Company. 




PHILADELPHIA. 



Philadelphia, the chief city of Pennsylvania 
and the third city of the United States, is situated 
on the Delaware River, ahout 100 miles hy ship- 
channel {vid Delaware Bay and River) from the 
Atlantic Ocean, 90 miles hy rail SW. of New 
York City and 136 miles NE. of Washington. 
Co-extensive with the county of Philadelphia, the 
city lies along the Delaware from the mouth of the 
Schuylkill River at League Island, northward, for 
ahout 15 miles, and has an average breadth of some 
8 miles. Its total area embraces nearly 130 sq. m., 
about one-eighth of which is comprised within the 
limits of the thickly built up portions of the city, 
while the rural sections consist of towns and 
villages which, though within the city limits, are 
locally known by the names they bore prior to 
their annexation to the city. Philadelphia is 
notably 'a city of homes.' Its inhabitants are 
largely composed of the well-to-do middle class, 
and it has within its limits more comfortable single 
residences than any other city in the world. 

The dominant architecture of the older sections 
of the city is of the severely plain, substantial style 
which characterised its Quaker founders, and which 
until the second half of the 19th century held 
undisputed sway, its outstanding features being 
uniformity of design and a general employment of 
rod brick as building material. A marked depar- 
ture has, however, lately taken place in the style 
of both the public and the private buildings of 
Philadelphia, among the former of which the city 
hall (1871 et seq.), built of white marble upon a 
granite base, and covering an area of 480 by 470 
feet, affords a striking instance. The height of the 
tower and dome is 537 ft. 4^ in. ; or 573 ft. 4h in. 
with the colossal figure of Penn (36 ft.), to sur- 



4 PHILADELPHIA. 

mount the whole, the structure being thus the 
second highest in the world. Over 500 rooms 
(mostly offices for city officials) are comprised in 
this edifice, and more than $14,000,000 had by 1891 
been expended upon it ; the entire cost, when com- 
pletely furnished for occupancy, is estimated at 
$20,000,000. Other buildings worthy of note 
architecturally are the Masonic Temple, of 
granite, erected at a cost of over $1,500,000; a 
United States government building of granite — 
containing the Post-office, United States court- 
rooms, and other offices of the general government 
—which cost about $8,000,000 ; a custom-house of 
marble, modelled after the Parthenon at Athens ; 
a naval asylum ; the United States Mint ; the 
Academy of Fine Arts ; the Academy of Natural 
Sciences, a massive Gothic structure with an exten- 
sive scientific library and a museum of a million or 
more specimens ; the Academy of Music ; and the 
buildings of the University of Pennsylvania. 

Nearly every street of importance is traversed 
by tramways, either horse, steam, cable, or electric. 
There are numerous well-shaded commons in the 
older portion of the city, some of which were laid 
out by William Penn" at the foundation of his 
'great towne' in 1682-83; while the Fairmount 
Park, some 3000 acres in extent, and bisected 
through its entire length of 10 miles or more 
by the Schuylkill River and its affluent the 
Wissahickon, 'stands without a rival among the 
pleasure-grounds of the great cities of the New 
World. In this park in 1876 was held the Cen- 
tennial Exhibition ; and in its environs are 
the Zoological Garden, the Fairmount Water- 
works, which supply to the city 100,000,000 gallons 
of water daily, the beautiful Horticultural Hall 
and Memorial Hall— remains of the Centennial 
Exhibition— the Laurel Hill Cemetery, &c. Among 
the statues in Philadelphia there are bronze 
equestrian figures of Generals Meade, McClellan, 
and Reynolds ; and there is a monument at Ger- 
mantown to the Union soldiers, and another in the 
grounds of Girard College to those of its former 
pupils who fell in the civil war. 

The churches include the old Swedes Church 
(1700), Christ Church (Episcopal, 1727-54), where 
Washington's pew is preserved, and a Roman 
Catholic cathedral. There are some 75 Baptist 
churches in the city, 90 Episcopal, 40 Lutheran, 
100 Methodist, 100 Presbyterian, 15 Quaker, 60 
Roman Catholic, and a number of others. Phila- 



PHILADELPHIA 





New City Hall, Philadelphia. 



6 PHILADELPHIA. 

delphia has almost from its foundation been noted 
for its benevolent institutions, but these have been 
greatly increased within recent years : prominent 
among such institutions are the Pennsylvania 
Hospital ( 1751 ), with suburban departments for 
the insane ; Episcopal, Presbyterian, and Methodist 
hospitals, and the St Joseph's and St Agnes' hos- 
pitals ; the hospitals in connection with the uni- 
versity and the several medical schools, &c. 

The educational facilities of Philadelphia are 
very great. At the public schools, which are main- 
tained at an annual cost of $2,600,000, there are 
2700 teachers and 130,000 pupils, some 2000 of the 
latter belonging to the high and normal schools. 
In the Roman Catholic schools 30,000 children are 
enrolled. Besides the Girard ( q. v. ) College, the city 
contains the Drexel Industrial Institute (endowed 
with $2,000,000) and the Cahill Roman Catholic 
High School ; and in Philadelphia or its immediate 
environs are the Williamson Free School of Mechan- 
ical Trades (endowed with some $2,200,000), state 
institutions for the blind and deaf and dumb, the 
Franklin Institute (1824, for the mechanic arts), 
Spring Garden Institute (for drawing, painting, 
and mechanical handiwork ), the Episcopal Academy 
(1785), several Catholic colleges and convents, and 
Episcopal, Lutheran, and Roman Catholic theo- 
logical seminaries. Crowning all these is the 
University of Pennsylvania, which began as an 
academy chartered by the sons of William Penn, 
became a college in 1755, and a university in 1779. 
At present it has over 1600 students and 75 pro- 
fessors and instructors, and embraces faculties of 
arts, science, architecture, natural history, and 
finance and economy (475 students), of medicine 
(680), dentistry (200), veterinary medicine (70), 
law (175), and physical education. The Jefferson 
Medical College (1825), with nearly 000 students, 
is one of the most famous medical schools of the 
United States ; and others here are the Hahnemann 
Medical College (1869), the Medico-Chirurgical 
College (1880), the Woman's Medical College 
(1850), and the Philadelphia Polyclinic and College 
for Graduates in Medicine. 

Manufactures, Commerce, &c. — Though in its 
early history noted for its extensive shipping- 
interests, as compared with those of its sister cities, 
it is rather as a manufacturing than as a com- 
mercial city that Philadelphia holds a present pro- 
minence. Here are immense establishments cover- 
ing acres of ground, from which millions of dollars 



PHILADELPHIA. 7 

worth of products are issued annually for the home 
and foreign markets, besides smaller concerns 
innumerable. The aggregate capital employed in 
manufacturing is estimated at .S300,000,000, the 
number of hands employed at 250,000, and the 
value of the annual product at $600,000,000. 
Among the prominent industries of this class are 
the building of locomotives, of which $10,000,000 
worth are constructed annually, employing some 
5000 men ; the manufacture of carpets, at which 
about 30,000 hands are employed, producing annu- 
ally goods valued at about $50,000,000 ; woollen 
and worsted goods, employing 35,000 hands, and 
valued at $45,000,000 ; upholstery goods, valued at 
$25,000,000; cotton goods, $15,000,000, &c. Gen- 
eral iron and steel products are computed to employ 
40,000 hands, whose product reaches $75,000,000 in 
value — the single article of saws, principally made 
by one firm, giving employment to 5000 workmen, 
and amounting in value to $2,500,000. There are 
several extensive sugar-refineries, the out-put of 
which reaches 20,000 barrels of refined sugar daily, 
and gives direct employment to 2500 hands ; oil- 
refineries, whose receipts of crude petroleum by 
railways and pipe-lines from the oil-fields of west- 
ern Pennsylvania reach 6,000,000 barrels per an- 
num ; nearly 100 breweries ; and several great 
chemical works. 

The foreign commerce of the city, while varying 
from year to year, shows on the whole a very con- 
siderable gain both as to its specific value and as 
to the proportion which it bears to the entire com- 
merce of the United States. The value of the ex- 
ports for the fiscal year 1869-70 was $16,927,610 ; 
for 1879-80, $49,649,693 ; for 1889-90, $37,410,683, 
being respectively 3*55, 5*94, and 4*36 per cent, of 
the entire value of the exports of the country for 
those years. The inmorts for the fiscal year 1869-70 
were valued at $14,48*3,21 1 ; for 1879-80, $35,944,500 ; 
for 1889-90, $53,936,317, being respectively 3 '32, 
5*38, and 6 '83 per cent, of the entire imports of the 
country. 

The city government is almost entirely adminis- 
tered by the mayor through various departments — 
of public works and of public safety, each admin- 
istered by a director who is appointed by him ; 
of receiver of taxes, of city treasurer, of city con- 
troller, and of law, whose heads are elected for 
three years ; a department of education governed by 
a board of 35 members (one from each city ward), 
who are appointed by the judges of the courts, and 



8 PHILADELPHIA. 

who serve without compensation ; a department of 
charities and correction, whose officials are appointed 
hy the mayor, and who serve without compensation ; 
and a sinking fund commission. The legislative 
branch of the city government consists of a chamber 
of select council of thirty-five members (one from 
each ward), who are elected for three years, and a 
chamber of common council of 117 members who 
are elected for two years, all of whom serve with- 
out pay. The judiciary of the city and county 
consists of twelve judges of the Courts of Common 
Pleas and four judges of the Orphans' Court, all of 
whom are elected for ten years. There are besides 
twenty-eight magistrates elected for five years. 

Founded in 1682 (see Penn), Philadelphia the 
year after was made the capital of Pennsylvania, 
and soon became a place of importance. It was the 
central point in the war of independence, and the 
city still preserves the Carpenters' Hall (1770), 
where the first congress met (4th September 1774), 
and the old State House (1735), with its Liberty 
Bell, where the Declaration of Independence (see 
Independence Day) was adopted in 1776, and 
which has since been famous as Independence Hall. 
At Philadelphia, moreover, the federal union was 
signed in 1778 ; and here, too, the constitution was 
framed, in 1787. An interest of another kind attaches 
to the fact that the Protestant Episcopal Church of 
North America was organised here in 1786. From 
1790 to 1800 Philadelphia was the federal capital ; 
and the first mint was established here in 1792. 
Later events have been the holding of the Cen- 
tennial Exhibition, in 1876, and the commemora- 
tion of Penn's visit, in 1882. Pop. (1700) 4500; 
(1800) 70,287; (I860) 568,034; (1880) 847,170; 
(1890) 1,046,964. 

See Scharf and Thompson's History of Philadelphia ( 3 
vols. 1884 ) ; Philadelphia and its Environs ( Lippincott, 
1890); and works by W. P. Hazard (1879), T. West- 
cott (1877), F. Cook (1882), and S. C. Woolscy ( 1888 ). 



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